Cycling should be more than just a marketing ploy

It seems that bikes are not the only things that accumulate in a cyclist’s life. Bikes fall under what’s known as the “N+1” formula, where N is how many bikes you currently own and N+1 is the correct number of bikes you should own.

Other bike-related paraphernalia involves more paradoxical equations that as yet I haven’t figured out.

For example, I do not need any more puncture repair kits – I have at least 20 scattered around my house and somehow that number seems to increase every month.

There seems to be a rift in the space-time continuum in my house where cycling-related artefacts appear without any purchasing effort on my part.

As a result I’m now drowning under a sea of buffs, pumps, multi-tools, tyres, gloves and so on.

Most of these items are in fact freebies from events and work, promotional items that manufacturers want to use to entice you into buying more of these products.

This is great when you don’t have a buff (a handy tube of material that keeps your neck, head and face warm), but when you have 38 of them, being given another goodie bag with more marketing tat just becomes irritating.

It is all, of course, part of our consumerist society and just because I succumb to it a lot of the time doesn’t mean I can’t be suspicious and frustrated by it.

The “N+1” rule must have been invented by some marketing bod at a bike manufacturer and feeds directly into a bike companies’ need to sell more.

The old adage of buying one multipurpose bike that’ll last a lifetime is not what bike companies want in their line-up of shiny new steeds.

Of course it’s in their interest to sell bikes that are supposedly multi-purpose and durable, but such a sales strategy is finite.

So, to overcome this, marketing departments have come up with activity-specific products like gravel bikes – really just a cyclocross with a different name.

There are bikes to suit every kind of riding you may wish to try and, if you believe the brochures, there is no way one bike could be used in place of the other.

Despite all of this I find myself succumbing to the commercial dreams of cycling companies. I look, starryeyed, at the brochures and websites and imagine how much better a rider I will be with my new shiny steed, or how comfortable my ride will be with the latest design and technology in cycle clothing.

Ultimately, though, I don’t need all this stuff. No matter what anyone tells you, it is the engine on the bike – you – that really counts. If you don’t take care of that, then it doesn’t really matter how expensive your new cycling kit is, or how many bikes you have in the shed.